Daytona '83 Trip

Virginia
South Carolina

Jacksonville Fla

Barry's master cylinder took a shit

Finally made it to the Beach...Daytona!

Main st at night

Boot Hill...nice Honda Civic!

Antique Bike show

Big Daddy Rat

I found these pictures from when me and my buddy Barry took a trip from Jersey to Daytona in 1983. We were both riding shovelheads at the time. We left at 9 PM in a torrential down pour. We didn't even get past Virginia that first night. The weather was shit for most of the ride down. It rained and was cold all the way to "South of the Border" South Carolina!

We were somewhere in southern Virginia the next morning and got pulled over for reckless driving. I talked our way out of that one. When you're 19 and from Jersey and you're looking at a Virginia State Trooper with mirror shades and that wide brim hat sayin "Y'all wanna go in for reckless drivin'?" Well I didn't know where "in" was and frankly did not want to find out what happens when you "go in"!!! so I did some talkin' and we ended up with a stern warning.

Later that night we pulled into a 7/11 to get some coffee. I'm not sure what state we were in.

As I watched Barry get off his bike and head towards the door of the store in his cover alls and sky mask, I yelled "Hey..." he turned toward me.."are you really gonna walk into that store at 2AM wearing a sky mask?" "Everyone down here carries a gun you know." He thought better of it and took off the mask.

There were a shit load of stories from that trip...hell, I got hit on my shovel by an 80 plus year old guy backing down an entrance ramp and cutting right across route 1 backwards! Barry ended up on the roof of his car banging on it with his helmet! He was always a bit high strung...

On the way down Barry's master cylinder took a shit and he just about hit me. We fixed that in Jacksonville.

After one hell of time down there, we rode home straight through, no sleep till Jersey!

Me and Barry got into a fight (with each other) at a truck stop in the middle of the night in North Carolina on the ride home. When it ended we parted with a "Fuck you!" "Yeah? Fuck You too!"... I didn't see him again until I was on the side of the road taking a leak in Delaware and he just happened to ride up behind me. I'm not sure how I passed him during the night because he took off first out of the truck stop, I left about 20 Min's after him.

Well anyway...We laughed our asses off and headed back to Jersey. We were both spent! On the Jersey turnpike I noticed he wasn't next to me anymore, I looked back and no shit he fell a sleep on his bike. A tractor trailer was right on his ass and hit the air horn! I thought he was gonna dump it! We pulled over and shook it off. We were only about 50 miles from home. I got home and walked into my dad's house as he was going to work in the morning. I didn't say a word I walked right past him opened the refrigerator and chugged a beer. Then I passed out for several hours.

This was the "Readers Digest" version of that trip. Shit I didn't even mention sleepin' in the cemetery across from the Boot Hill... maybe next time.